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Teaching a Stone to Talk: Expeditions and Encounters (Paperback)

by Annie Dillard (Author) "IT HAD BEEN LIKE DYING, that sliding down the mountain pass..." (more)
Key Phrases: palo santo trees, whistling swans, mangrove island, Santa Claus, Miss White, Napo River (more...)
4.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (19 customer reviews)

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Editorial Reviews

Review
"A collection of meditations like polished stones--painstakingly worded, tough-minded, yet partial to mystery, and peerless when it comes to injecting larger resonances into the natural world." -- --Kirkus Reviews

"Teaching a Stone to Talk is superb. As with the flying fish, Annie Dillard doesn't do it often, but when she does she silver-streaks out of the blue and archingly transcends all other writers of our day in all the simple, intimate, and beautiful ways of the natural master." -- -- R. Buckminster Fuller

"The natural world is ignited by her prose and we see the world as an incandescent metaphor of the spirit...Few writers evoke better than she the emotion of awe, and few have ever conveyed more graphically the weight of silence, the force of the immaterial." -- -- Robert Taylor, Boston Globe

"This little book is haloed and informed throughout by Dillard's distinctive passion and intensity, a sort of intellectual radiance that reminds me both Thoreau and Emily Dickinson." -- -- Edward Abbey, Chicago Sun-Times

Product Description
Here, in this compelling assembly of writings, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Annie Dillard explores the world of natural facts and human meanings.

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Product Details

  • Paperback: 176 pages
  • Publisher: Harper Perennial; Revised edition (July 20, 1988)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0060915412
  • ISBN-13: 978-0060915414
  • Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.1 x 0.5 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 4.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.com Sales Rank: #31,700 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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    #5 in  Books > Literature & Fiction > Authors, A-Z > ( D ) > Dillard, Annie
    #8 in  Books > Literature & Fiction > Books & Reading > Women Writers & Feminist Theory
    #8 in  Books > Nonfiction > Women's Studies > Women Writers

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Teaching a Stone to Talk: Expeditions and Encounters
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Pilgrim at Tinker Creek (Harper Perrennial Modern Classics)
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Pilgrim at Tinker Creek (Harper Perrennial Modern Classics) 3.8 out of 5 stars (220)
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Customer Reviews

19 Reviews
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Average Customer Review
4.3 out of 5 stars (19 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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51 of 52 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Contains some of her finest essays, March 3, 2002
By Robert Moore (Chicago, IL USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 50 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)      
I remember a paradoxical statement about the Bible that I heard attributed to Karl Barth: "The Bible is not the word of God, but it contains the word of God." Well, TEACHING A STONE TO TALK is not Annie Dillard's finest book (that distinction belongs to either PILGRIM AT TINKERS CREEK or AN AMERICAN CHILDHOOD), but it contains her best work, i.e., some essays that are as good as anything that she has ever written. Almost inevitably, as in most collections, some of the essays aren't nearly as strong as the best, but the good ones make this slender volume essential reading for any fan of Ms. Dillard.

My personal favorite among the fourteen comprising this book is also the longest, "An Expedition to the Pole." I consider myself to be a deeply religious person, but I also find church services to be almost unbearable (much like one of my literary heroes, Samuel Johnson). In this essay, Dillard contrasts her experiences in an utterly dreadful church service with many of the attempts in the nineteenth century to mount expeditions to reach the North Pole. The attempts of those adventurers are simultaneously tragic and laughable, in that their goal was so vastly beyond their means. The implication is that the same is true in worship: we attempt to worship god, but our efforts are clumsy and fall far short of the mark. There is nobility in both, and certainly Dillard doesn't want to imply that worship is futile. But the parallels are there. It is a brilliant essay.

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16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars From The Mundane To The Infinite ... And Back Again, October 4, 2004
By Jon Linden (Warren, N.J. United States) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)      
This book truly is a well crafted and literary set of short stories; all or most of them being autobiographical. But the author does something special in this book. Her stories all center around the physical, mixed with the spiritual, mixed with the metaphysical, both alone and in concert, and finally, in the way they seem to co-exist, at least to her perception and observation.

The substance of her plot is more a substance of a progression of human feelings, than events. The events just happen, the reasons, she tells us, are personal, and mostly uncontrollable. But they ARE. They exist temporally, spiritually, physically, and metaphysically all at the same time. How each of us sees these things is a bit like Albert Einstein's General and Special Theories of Relativity. It all depends on how you come to the words of Annie Dillard, and how we interpret what she is saying. Whether you can relate to it out of your own experience, or whether you can live it vicariously through Dillard's writing matters not, what matters is the attitude and state of mind that one brings to the stories.

For readers interested in a mind expanding vision of reality, and non-reality, this book is beautifully written to take you to all these places. And it takes you through feelings, that almost every reader can relate to. It is worth every minute spent on it.
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20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Mesmerizing adventures........, November 3, 2001
.......as can only be expressed by Annie Dillard.

This collection of Dillard's travels and experiences will simply make you want to go out and experience each for yourself!

You will long to find yourself in the midst of a solar eclipse: "The grasses were wrong; they were platinum. Their every detail of stem, head and blade shone lightness and artificially distinct as an art photographer's platinum print. This color has never been seen on earth. The hues were metallic; their finish was matte. The hillside was a 19th century tinted photograph from which the tints have faded...............The sky was navy blue. My hands were silver." Reading Dillard's words has simply made me promise myself that I will not pass from this life without having witnessed the wonder of a solar eclipse.

The remainder of Dillard's expeditions and encounters are equally amazing. Travel with her words and come to know the terrors of the North Pole, the sheer tenacity of weasels, the natural wonders of the Galapagos Islands, the journeys of mangrove islands, fantasic mirages over Puget Sound and much more. Dillard brings each to full life through her descriptions and her thoughts on each. I highly recommend this book to anyone with a sense of curiosity and adventure! You'll love it!

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Teaching a reader to write
Essays to tease the depths, this collection comprises some pf the best of Dillard's work. Clear insight and brilliant analogy move from the natural world to the soul. Read more
Published 20 months ago by Cecil Bothwell

5.0 out of 5 stars Immerse yourself in Annie Dillard's thoughts and unique use of language
This is a book of timeless essays regarding our journey through life. Enjoy.

From the essay - Sojourners.
"We are down here in time, where beauty grows. Read more
Published 22 months ago by Patricia Kramer

1.0 out of 5 stars teaching a stone to talk
Tis is some of the worst prose i've ever tried to read. It reminds me of those old Dick and Jane primers in which everything is repeated. Read more
Published on April 29, 2007 by Cathy A. Wethington

5.0 out of 5 stars Teaching a Stone to Talk - Good Read
Annie Dillard's work is most certainly her best with the exception of her Thoreau-esque first work. Her writing style and personality are captivating as she engages with a myriad... Read more
Published on March 11, 2006 by Kyle S. Murphy

1.0 out of 5 stars Everyone knows that stones can't talk...
Poetry is poetry and prose is prose. In my opinion, the extent to which they are mixed is the extent to which the quality of each, with some exceptions, deteriorates. Read more
Published on February 14, 2005 by Kavity Killer

5.0 out of 5 stars From as high as eagles
Annie Dillard is one of the most satisfying essayists I know. Although I am not, generally, a reader of nature studies, Dillard's essays seem just perfect to me. Read more
Published on September 9, 2004 by Jeremy W. Forstadt

5.0 out of 5 stars A Luminescent Feast for the Sentient
Her Pilgrim at Tinker Creek won the Pulitzer for non-fiction in 1974, establishing her reputation for magical writing and eyes that see the world in a special way that open ours... Read more
Published on April 18, 2004 by Michail Kyril

5.0 out of 5 stars Seeing Life With Her Eyes Open
A couple of months ago, I happened upon the wholly enchanting For the Time Being by Annie Dillard. Following up on that, I just read this Teaching a Stone to Talk, and I will... Read more
Published on May 21, 2003 by oddsfish

4.0 out of 5 stars Teaching a Scientist to Write
Albert Einstein himself once said, "The whole of science is nothing more than a refinement of everyday thinking. Read more
Published on March 10, 2002 by Leah

5.0 out of 5 stars She Ecslipses All
If you know Annie Dillard then you know her stunning essay "Total Eclipse." This is the book that contains that breathtaking work of art. Read more
Published on February 17, 2001 by matthew robinson

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